Get Schooled at New Horizons » windows

Isolate your wireless clients from your LAN

Get Schooled — Sat, 08 Jan 2011 16:00:46 +0000

Isolate your wireless clients from your LAN (Windows)

Adding a wireless access point to your network provides a great convenience for those with wireless equipped notebook or handheld computers, but adding wireless can also create many security issues. In addition to the usual wireless security advice–disable SSID broadcasting, change the default settings on the WAP, use WEP or WPA encryption–another security measure is to isolate the wireless clients from your wired Ethernet LAN by creating a separate segment for them. Here’s how: Your firewall should have three or more network interfaces. One is the external interface to the internet. That leaves two internal interfaces. Plug a switch for your Ethernet computers into one, and plug a switch or hub into the other, into which you’ll plug your Wireless Access Point.

Check out our Security training!

Take the express lane to a Windows shutdown

Get Schooled — Fri, 04 Jun 2010 18:35:40 +0000

If your system has frozen, you might find that you need to shut down Windows as quickly as possible. Although you can accomplish this task simply by pressing the power button on the computer, there’s a way for you to shut down the computer that’s less harmful to the operating system. To do it:
1. Press [Ctrl][Alt][Delete] to display the Windows Security dialog box.
2. Hold down the [Ctrl] key and click the Shut Down button.
3. Click OK to confirm that you want to perform an emergency shutdown of the computer.
Be aware that when you perform an emergency shutdown, Windows doesn’t prompt you to save any open documents. To avoid losing your work, make sure that you save anything you’re currently working on (if possible) before performing an emergency shutdown.

Tired of doing a print screen or a mark->copy on a DOS command box?

Get Schooled — Mon, 12 Apr 2010 16:21:33 +0000

Here’s a better way:
To copy the contents of your screen to a text editor like notepad, you can perform the following command instead of copying the text one screen at a time:

C:\> | clip

For example, if you want to see all contents of the Program Files folder in your drive C:
1. Select the Windows Start button, select Run and type “CMD” to launch a DOS session.
2. Type C:\>dir “Program Files” | clip
3. Open a text editor and press [Ctrl]V to paste the contents.
The clip command will copy the output results of the to your Windows clipboard. Once you are in your text editor, paste the text into a file. This command works in XP and Vista as well as the newer Windows Servers (Windows 2000 Server and Up).

Is Remote Administration the Weak Link in Your Security?

Get Schooled — Tue, 02 Mar 2010 23:22:16 +0000

Windows:

The ability to remotely administer your servers isn’t just a convenience; in some cases, it’s essential. But, when a system can be accessed remotely — especially a domain controller or other critical server — there’s a chance that it will be accessed by the wrong person, for the wrong reasons.

You can control access in a number of ways. For example, you can restrict access to specific ports (such as 3389, used by terminal services) so that the ports can be access only from specific computers. You can also configure User Rights to control who can and can’t log on through terminal services. Create a group and place those users in it who should be able to access the server’s desktop through terminal services/Remote Desktop, then add the group to the Log On Through Terminal Services user right.

It’s also a good idea to ensure that solicited remote assistance is disabled through the Computer Configuration | Administrative Templates | System | Remote Assistance | Solicited Remote Assistance entry in Group Policy.

Speed Freaks Rejoice!

Get Schooled — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 16:23:55 +0000

If you’re a speed freak and feeling adventurous in squeezing every second to make your Windows PC start faster, then this is for you.

The “Windows” boot process is a complex set of processes usually governed by a few config files.

Let’s examine Boot.ini:

Boot.ini is a configuration file usually located at the root/base directory of your boot disk (usually C:\). This can be edited via a text editor such as Notepad.

In this tip, we will try to speed up the boot process by removing the unnecessary portions of the process. The examples we will use here are applicable to Windows XP.

For other versions of Windows, you can refer to this link: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms791511.aspx.

To speed up the boot process:
1. Open Notepad, then open the BOOT.INI file (usually located at C:\). As a best practice, always back-up your boot.ini file before doing anything, in case you want to revert back to the original settings.
2. Remove the /bootlog parameter. The /bootlog parameter records drivers being loaded during the boot time. It helps to determine in which driver has an issue. But if you are not diagnosing, you might as well remove this.
3. Add the /noguiboot parameter. The /noguiboot parameter disables the basic graphic video support during boot time. Once added, the graphic splash screen before the login screen is skipped. This is also handy if you want to diagnose video problems when you load Windows.
Your config line should look something like this:

[boot loader]
timeout=30
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS=”Microsoft Windows XP Professional”
/noexecute=optin /fastdetect /noguiboot

If you are not comfortable editing the boot.ini configuration file, you can use Microsoft’s standard configuration tool, msconfig.

Simply go to Start > Run, and type msconfig in the Run text box. Then go to the boot.ini tab. This should speed up the Boot time significantly.